The Essence of Life

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Arrivederci Torino

Since June last year I’ve been working in Europe, and
due to that I kept an apartment in Torino, the fantastic piemontese city that
was the first capital of unified Italy.

While working and spending a lot of time in Europe
and having my family in the United States had its challenges and made me sick
and tired of airplane food, not to mention all the time spent in airports and
flying across the Atlantic, it also had many positive aspects.

I could tell stories about all the museums and gun
clubs that I visited, restaurants known and unknown where I enjoyed fantastic
meals, sometimes with good company, many times alone, and the moments of
solitude that led me to start to write this blog.

Now, almost ten months since I started my assignment
in Europe I am about to start a new chapter in my professional life, and due to
that I no longer have an apartment in Torino, nor will I be going to Europe
with the same frequency.

I hope to have the opportunity to spend a lot more
time with my family, but this welcome change is bittersweet in at least one
point. My father used to tell me that one of the most important aspects of life
is that you should leave tracks by the places that you travel, and that you
should always be able to go back to those places and be well received. My
tracks are my friends.

In less than a year I had the privilege of
establishing some fantastic friendships, and to celebrate that I had a farewell
(in Italian “arrivederci”) dinner at my favorite restaurant in the world, “FRADIN DA VITO” in San Mauro Torinese,
that belongs to my dear friend, superb chef and master hunter, Vito Benevelli
and his gracious wife Signora
Luciana.

To celebrate our friendship, my brave friend Pino
Facchini, president of the Federazione Italiana
Tiro a Volo (FITAV) – Comitato
Regionale Piemonte, and my host in almost all my shooting experiences in
Italy, along his son Rocco and Rocco’s wife Rosaria, joined me at Fradin for a
fantastic meal.

From the Terrina
di Pesce Persico, first of many antipasti to the last drop of Vito’s Genepi, a fantastic after dinner liqueur
of Alpine flowers made by Vito himself, we spend several hours talking,
remembering, eating, drinking, laughing or just enjoying life.

When we leave our tracks in the hearts of our
friends, saying goodbye is just an excuse to meet again in the future. Even
with tears in my eyes, I happily say:

About Me

Rodrigo Tardelli Meirelles was born in Brazil, in 1969, and raised on the family farm, Fazenda Taboa, in close contact with the outdoors. By his own definition a dreamer and an explorer, Rodrigo was launched at a young age into a journey in search of knowledge that took him across countries and continents, and the world became the fertile ground where the stories in this book were planted and are now being harvested. True to the pioneer spirit Rodrigo set himself to explore the world, working and raising a family while maintaining his dreams alive and pursuing his passion for hunting and shooting wherever he goes. He currently lives in Traverse City, Michigan, with his wife Maria José, children Maria Eduarda and Daniel and their black lab Tupã.